Pfarrkirche St. Nikolaus, Roman Catholic parish church in Veringenstadt, Baden-Württemberg, Germany
Pfarrkirche St. Nikolaus is a parish church in Veringenstadt featuring a prominent bell tower reaching about 130 feet (40 meters) that rises above the town. The building combines Romanesque elements from the 1300s with 19th-century expansions and houses artworks spanning Gothic and Baroque periods, along with five cast bells.
The oldest sections date to 1316, when the Romanesque entrance portal and baptismal font were created. The current building took shape between 1862 and 1871, replacing earlier structures with new interior spaces and an expanded tower.
The church's name recalls the small St. Nicholas chapel that stood here before the present building; a chapel with a semicircular choir was consecrated on 2 June 1316 by Berthold, auxiliary bishop of Konstanz. By 1515 seven chaplaincies existed in Veringenstadt, among them the Ursula chaplaincy (from 1360) and the Anna chaplaincy (from 1515), later merged into the St. Nicholas parish. The medieval parish church of Deutstetten, once dedicated to Bishop Erhard and Walburga, fell into ruin around 1530, and its figure of St. Erhard, carved around 1410, was probably taken over here.
The tower's lower shaft, with its Romanesque portal, dates to the early 13th century, while everything above the second storey was built in 1863; the tower reaches about 40 metres. Until 1956 an exterior pulpit hung on the south side of the tower, its parapet made of early Gothic tracery from the pre-1863 communion rail. The church belongs to the Straßberg-Veringen pastoral unit in the Sigmaringen-Meßkirch deanery.
The oldest sculpture in the church is a 68 cm limewood figure of Bishop Erhard, carved around 1410, probably by an unknown Veringen sculptor. It likely came from the medieval Deutstetten parish church, which was dedicated to Erhard and Walburga and had fallen into ruin by around 1530. Erhard is shown with a tonsure and a lock over his forehead, wearing a plain red chasuble.
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